EDITORIAL: U.S. has few options in Iraq

Published: Monday, June 23, 2014 at 05:20 PM.

The most frustrating thing about the chaos now engulfing Iraq — a country where 4,488 Americans died in a futile attempt to establish a stable, Western-friendly government — is that almost everyone saw it coming, and saw it coming years ago.
We saw it coming when the last U.S. combat troops left Iraq in 2011. We wondered how Iraq’s wobbly armed forces, on their own, could hold off an insurgency.
We saw it coming when George W. Bush agreed in 2008 to the pullout and set a date for it. It’s risky to tell the bad guys when you’ll be leaving.
We saw it coming soon after the United States invaded Iraq in 2003 amid politicians’ cheery promises the war would be quick and easy. It wasn’t.
But we got out when Mr. Bush said we would. Now, rebels are taking over towns across Iraq, laying siege to oil refineries and approaching the capital city of Baghdad. And the Obama administration is trying to respond, to help the Iraqis in a way that doesn’t send U.S. troops back into a war we thought we’d left.
Our eight-year slog through Iraq at least taught us what won’t work. Toppling one government and hoping for a friendlier successor won’t work. Intervening in somebody else’s civil war won’t work. Americans trained and armed Iraqi security forces, only to see them skedaddle when facing a band of insurgents.
As for what will work, President Obama’s options are limited and their efficacy only speculative. Manned and unmanned U.S. aircraft are flying over Iraq on intelligence-gathering missions. Airstrikes are a possibility. The president is dispatching a few hundred advisers to try, again, putting some steel in Iraqi troops’ backs.
Americans shouldn’t get their hopes up. From March 2003 through December 2011 we tried everything we could think of in Iraq and it wasn’t enough. Military advisers and intel assistance probably won’t make much difference now.
Instead, let’s pray for the safety of Americans still in Iraq and hope that no more will have to die in that distant country. What’s going on in Iraq isn’t our war. Not anymore.

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The most frustrating thing about the chaos now engulfing Iraq — a country where 4,488 Americans died in a futile attempt to establish a stable, Western-friendly government — is that almost everyone saw it coming, and saw it coming years ago.
We saw it coming when the last U.S. combat troops left Iraq in 2011. We wondered how Iraq’s wobbly armed forces, on their own, could hold off an insurgency.
We saw it coming when George W. Bush agreed in 2008 to the pullout and set a date for it. It’s risky to tell the bad guys when you’ll be leaving.
We saw it coming soon after the United States invaded Iraq in 2003 amid politicians’ cheery promises the war would be quick and easy. It wasn’t.
But we got out when Mr. Bush said we would. Now, rebels are taking over towns across Iraq, laying siege to oil refineries and approaching the capital city of Baghdad. And the Obama administration is trying to respond, to help the Iraqis in a way that doesn’t send U.S. troops back into a war we thought we’d left.
Our eight-year slog through Iraq at least taught us what won’t work. Toppling one government and hoping for a friendlier successor won’t work. Intervening in somebody else’s civil war won’t work. Americans trained and armed Iraqi security forces, only to see them skedaddle when facing a band of insurgents.
As for what will work, President Obama’s options are limited and their efficacy only speculative. Manned and unmanned U.S. aircraft are flying over Iraq on intelligence-gathering missions. Airstrikes are a possibility. The president is dispatching a few hundred advisers to try, again, putting some steel in Iraqi troops’ backs.
Americans shouldn’t get their hopes up. From March 2003 through December 2011 we tried everything we could think of in Iraq and it wasn’t enough. Military advisers and intel assistance probably won’t make much difference now.
Instead, let’s pray for the safety of Americans still in Iraq and hope that no more will have to die in that distant country. What’s going on in Iraq isn’t our war. Not anymore.